Original Research - Special Collection: Eben Scheffler Festschrift

Mental mapping in the admiration song in Song of Songs 7:2–7

Stefan Fischer
HTS Teologiese Studies / Theological Studies | Vol 75, No 3 | a4998 | DOI: https://doi.org/10.4102/hts.v75i3.4998 | © 2019 Stefan Fischer | This work is licensed under CC Attribution 4.0
Submitted: 02 April 2018 | Published: 23 April 2019

About the author(s)

Stefan Fischer, Institute for Old Testament Studies and Biblical Archaeology, Protestant Faculty of Theology, University of Vienna, Vienna, Austria; and, Department of Old and New Testament Studies, University of the Free State, Bloemfontein, South Africa

Abstract

Mental mapping is a method of interpreting with conceptual metaphors. This method is applied to the admiration song in Song of Songs 7:2–7. The song is interpreted in the context of a dance. For the purpose of interpretation, ancient Egyptian dance paintings and love poems are taken into account. The interpretation presents a methodological study that unmasks arbitrary exegesis and implausible interpretations. It discovers its subtle conceptual metaphors and shows a strategy for a comprehensible exegesis. As a side effect, the male chauvinism present in this song is deconstructed.

Keywords

Exegesis; Song of Songs; Methodology; Metaphor; Mapping

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